Having said that, however, I need to point out that it is not just the Lutheran Church that utilizes a rite of passage such as Confirmation to mark a young person’s movement into adult responsibilities in their faith. 

Betty and I are close friends with a couple who happen to be Jewish.  Last Spring, we had the honor of being invited to the Bat Mitvah of their granddaughter in a synagogue in a northern section of Philadelphia.  Now, in the Jewish faith, a “Bar Mitzvah” marks the coming of age of a 13 year old male.  A “Bat Mitzvah” commemorates the coming of age of a 13 year old female.

Bar and Bat Mitzvahs can be either singular events or group events.  On this particular day, only young Emily was being “bat mitzvahed.”  Only family members and close friends of the family had been invited.  We gathered in the synagogue and were honored to be part of the assembled congregation of about 60 people.  The service was impressive – and, by our standards, quite long – 1 ½ hours.  Emily essentially led the entire worship service along with the very talented female cantor who had been her spiritual guide through the instruction process.  Much of the service Emily led was intoned in Hebrew.  That was particularly moving since only Emily’s mom is Jewish.  Her dad is Japanese!

You see, Emily had spent countless Saturdays at the synagogue learning both Hebrew and the history of her people.  It was essential to her rabbi and her cantor that Emily understood fully the heritage that was hers as a religious Jew.  Symbolically, during the service, her grandfather and my good friend, joined Emily at the front of the synagogue to remove the Torah from the Ark and to parade it around the midst of the assembled congregation.  Emily walked with him and then helped him return the Torah to the Ark where it was stored.  This symbolized Emily’s willingness to join the people of Israel in sharing the Word of God with those whom she met along life’s path.  Emily also presented the essence of her independent study on a selected passage of scripture as the “homily” for the morning.

As my wife and I sat there and observed – and participated – in the service of the Bat Mitzvah, we were very, very impressed by the effort that Emily and other Jewish young men and women are expected to exert as they become adult members of their community of faith.  We were also greatly impressed by the commitment that both Emily and her parents made to this process.  Scholastic sports does not take precedence – nor do any other social involvements of student or parents.  You either commit yourself to this process or you do not achieve this much longed for honor in the Jewish faith.

While we were impressed by the effort and commitment of Emily and her parents, we were also a bit taken aback by the poverty of our “catechetical experience” and Rite of Confirmation in comparison.  Suffice it to say that, in the 34 years I have been in the ministry, I have watched the expectations of and commitment from both catechetical students and their parents to be lowered in order to assure that your young people actually make it to Confirmation.  I have watched scholastic sports and other social commitments take precedent over preparation for adult responsibility in the Church.  And as I observed the Bat Mitzvah, both Betty and I were ashamed that we allowed the expectations we have of our own young people to be so compromised by the “pressures of our culture.”  As we left the synagogue on that beautiful Spring day, we were determined to do something to change that – at least in our own parishes.